English

English’s Wolfe to give next
Scientia lecture

Cary Wolfe, the Bruce and Elizabeth Dunlevie Professor of English, will present the next Scientia lecture on “Animality and Disability or Learning From Temple Grandin” at 4 p.m. Feb. 28 in McMurtry Auditorium, Anne and Charles Duncan Hall.

Wolfe will discuss the case of Temple Grandin, an associate professor of animal science at Colorado State University, who designed nearly half of the cattle-handling devices used in North America.

Grandin contends that her experience with autism and the disorder’s specific characteristics has given her an unusually empathetic understanding of how nonhumans experience the world. As a result, Grandin’s curved chute design and race systems are used worldwide, and her writings on the flight zone and other principles of grazing animal behavior have helped reduce stress on animals during handling.

Wolfe’s lecture will explore Grandin’s work and how it can be used to find a new understanding of central questions in animal and disability studies.

With the theme “Animals and Humans,” this year’s Scientia program examines how humans view animals. Humans have always lived in the midst of animals and in the process have developed complex relationships with them. Animals have served as companions, religious figures and manifestations of natural beauty. At the same time, humans have relied on them for food, clothing, transportation and muscle power, and in some cases, humans have reinvented animals, selecting traits that help or please people.

Scientia is an institute of Rice University faculty founded in 1981 by the mathematician and historian of science Salomon Bochner. Scientia provides an opportunity for scholarly discussion across disciplinary boundaries; its members and fellows come from a wide range of academic disciplines.

For more information on Scientia, visit <www.ruf.rice.edu/~scientia>.